The Fragility of Frost
by Schultzo
Summary: Jack Frost is spiralling into depression and is hurting himself to try and deal with the pain. This story begins in 1990 prior to Jack joining the gaurdians, and follows him as he learns the truth about his past and struggles to choose between life and death. Content warning for self harm.
1. Chapter 1

**- Content Warning for Self Injury -**

The Fragility of Frost  
Chapter One ~

Sadness washed over him. He felt it come in waves as tears threatened to pour from his eyes. He slumped to the snowy ground, dropped his staff, and drew his knees up to his chest, burying his face in them and allowing a deep sob to wrack his body. Alone. He was always alone. Nobody cared about him. His shoulders shook as grief overtook him. He internally cursed himself. Stupid. Useless. No matter how hard he tried to stay out of the way, he was always a burden on everyone. His hands clenched down on his forearms, squeezing tightly the tender flesh through his sleeves, trying to drown out his sorrow with pain. His hands trembled as he released his arms and dug into his pocket for the relief that was stored there. He pulled out a razor blade, and simply stared at it fuzzily as tears continued to escape from his eyes.

Finally he drew up one if the sleeves of his hoodie, exposing the scarred skin below. His inner arm was covered with old, white scars, with newer red and purple cuts upon them. He brought the blade to rest against his scarred skin. Then, inhaling deeply, he pressed down while pulling the bade quickly across his arm. He gasped involuntarily as pain flooded his vision for a quick second, blissfully obscuring the sadness that welled inside of him. He focused his eyes on the small beads of blood that appeared along the length of the wound, growing larger until they melted into one line of blood. The cut had chipped a little bit of the sadness inside him away, and he raised the razor again, hoping to gain a little more control. He placed the blade against his skin, just beside the first wound, and then pulled it across his arm. He repeated the process again and again.

He cut open his flesh with the razor over and over, each time feeling a little more numb and little less overwhelmed. He desperately wanted to stop the hurt he felt. He repeatedly cut his arm, trying to bury his sorrows, each time dampening the voices inside his head a little more. Finally he stopped, and dropped the blade into the snow. He stared intently as his blood escaped from the wounds he had made. It slowly oozed out of the openings along the length of his arm, then rolled down in a red cascade.

He watched the blood; his blood; drip off of his pale skin and sink into white snow below, staining it. Then he laughed. Slowly at first, but soon the sick chuckles shook his shoulders. The flow of his blood out of the cuts slowed, and he ran his fingers over the clotting wounds, coating his fingers with the sticky redness. He then tenderly licked the blood from each of his slender fingers, while a soft smile graced his lips.

"I'm fucking insane" he sang softly as he looked up at the moon. He fumbled in the snow for a moment before finding his razor blade. Stuffing it in his pocket, he picked up his staff and used it to help pull himself to his feet. He took a few wobbly steps, dizzy from the blood loss. He shook his head to clear the fogginess, then took to the air, riding the wind to Burgess Lake.

His bare feet touched down on the ice covering the lake. Frowning, he examined his arm to discover the blood flow had stilled. Desperate to maintain his delirious state, he drew the razor blade out, dropping his staff to the ice. He pressed the blade deep into his wrist. His skin gave way beneath the narrow strip of metal, and blood began to pour from the newest cut. He then pulled up his other sleeve and shakily held the blade in his non-dominate hand. He pushed the blade against his opposite wrist, and pulled it quickly down and across the flesh, making a deep gash perpendicular to the length of his forearm. Blood bubbled out of the depth of the wound and quickly flowed down his arm. He dropped the blade in shock.

He grimaced through the aching pain emanating from his wrists, and picked up his staff. He nearly keeled over, but he clung his staff best he could. His blood ran down from his wrists and dripped from his elbows, splattering onto the surface of the ice. He closed his eyes and remembered the first time he had seen the lake. Clean and pure. It was the first day of his life, and he had been so happy to discover his power. So happy to be alive. He smiled at the memory, but the smile never reached his eyes as he opened them to look at the pool of blood forming on the ice. He prodded it with the end of his staff. Intricate patterns of frost curled out from the bloody stain, carrying the red colour as it spread across the ice. His frost, dyed with blood, crept along the surface of the ice like the blood that throbbed out of his wrists.

He suddenly felt quite lightheaded. Blackness threatened at the corners of his vision as the blood continued to seep from his wrists. With a cry, he collapsed, clutching to his staff as he fell against the ice. Fighting to remain conscious, he rolled onto his back and stared up and the moon. The heaviness in his body lessened as he lay on his back, breathing raggedly. His eyes traced the contours of the moon as his mind raced, trying to understand the cruel life he was born to live.

"You shouldn't have created me! I hate myself more than anything. Living like this is torture. I'm invisible. Useless. All I do is hurt people. I'm all alone. Why did you do this to me?" He screamed into the night, glaring up at the moon. Tears stung at the corners of his eyes but he refused to look away from the moon, demanding an answer. But the silence was unbroken. He felt so lonely. He had no one to talk to. Strangled sobs got caught in his throat, choking him, and he again lost himself in sorrow. Eventually he gave into the fatigue that plagued his body as he slipped into a nightmarish sleep.


	2. Chapter 2

The Fragility of Frost  
Chapter Two ~

His eyes snapped open. The moon still shone above, illuminating the frozen lake. He looked at the moon, sighed, and let his eyes glaze over with tears. "Still here," he whispered sadly, summoning the snow to start falling above him. The cold snowflakes drifted down slowly from the sky, landing softly upon his face. He felt slightly comforted by the light flurry. Moving his hand to brush the hair from his forehead, he gasped out loud as a sharp pain shot through his arm. The blood had clotted and dried on his arms, his hands numb and spasming as he tried to move his fingers. He rolled onto his side and curled into a ball, clutching his arms to his chest.

He breathed deeply, trying to calm himself, while the pain radiating from his wrists dissipated. As he lay against the ice, he squeezed his eyes shut as his mind raced. It was being alone he hated most. He needed someone who could see him; someone who would talk to him. After seemingly endless years of people simply passing through him, he longed to feel the touch of another person. He was a prisoner in his own body, held captive for nearly 300 years.

_When he first awoke in Burgess lake, all alone without any knowledge about whom he was, he was easily distressed. He quickly learned that being emotionally loaded made it difficult for him to control his power. He had gone from village to village trying to be seen, hopeful to find someone to talk to. However, he was unsuccessful in his search. He grew increasingly confused and lost, but mostly scared because he didn't understand why he wasn't like everyone else. Pestering the moon yielded no answers; the moon only spoke to him his first night in Burgess lake to tell him that his name was Jack Frost. Eventually, after having searched and searched unsuccessfully for someone to whom he was visible, Jack snapped. Anger was what washed over him first. Anger at the millions of people who ignored him when he so desperately cried out for them to notice him. _

_Nobody saw him, so he decided to make them feel his presence. He had gradually built up a hatred for the people ignorant to his existence. It had come to the point where he couldn't control his hate anymore. He went to the place where his lonely life began, and flew to the nearby town of Burgess. There, he began mustering up a massive storm. As he released the storm, he unleashed years of pent up frustration. As he stood alone in the empty town, people cowering in their homes from the building winds and the gusts riddled with icy snow, Jack's anger burned. He clutched his staff, knuckles white, as he fiercely jabbed the ground with the end of his staff. The snow that lay there responded by swirling up and pelting the houses at a relentless pace. Jack screamed into the roaring wind, the cry echoing his resentment for those who ignored him. The blizzard quickly built to full force, fuelled by Jack's anguish. _

_Jack struggled to see the town that had been visible only minutes earlier. Suddenly a boom sounded, barely audible over the howling winds. Jack however instantly honed in on the bone chilling shriek that followed, something eerily familiar to him about the sound. The blind rage that he had created the storm in vanished, and instead dread formed in the pit of his stomach. He tore towards the sound, sightlessly stumbling in the huge drifts of snow. A collapsed structure loomed ahead; the wooden walls had given out on one side of the house, the roof sagging dangerously under the assault of snow. Jack shakily flew through the air towards the wreckage, blood pounding in his ears. _

_He pulled at the wood, clawing to get under the rough wooden beams on the collapsed side of the small house. Under him, someone buried beneath the wood and snow released a muffled cry. He panicked trying to drag the timber off of the person just below the snow. As his veins surged powerfully with guilt, his powers exploded wildly without control. In his frenzy he unwittingly created jagged icicles that shot up from the ground, puncturing the wooden debris as they climbed towards the sky. He jumped back in surprise, dodging the shards of ice as they sprung up around him. _

_As he was struggling to stay aloft in the angry winds, he saw one of his monstrous icicles tear through the very spot where the the person was buried. As the ice erupted from the drift of snow, it snagged the person's body, carrying them out of the snow and debris as the tip tore through their chest. Jack trembled in horror as he realized the ice pierced the chest of a young girl. _

_"Stop!" Jack choked out, focusing all his power on stopping the icicles that protruded from the frozen soil. He fell to the ground as the winds died down and the snow fall thinned. The icy spikes shattered into millions of tiny shards, the girl dropping to the ground as the ice gave way. Jack rushed over to the girl, falling to his knees as he clamped his hands tightly over the gaping wound in her chest. Blood seeped through his fingers and he realized he was crying as tears froze on his cheeks. She looked so young, no older than 14. He couldn't quite believe what he had done as the blood continued to pour from her body. She shuttered under his hands, and opened her big brown eyes to glance wildly up at him. She choked on blood as she tried to speak, managing to whisper, "I'm scared Jack." _

_He stared down at her, trying to understand her words and how she had come to know his name. Her breathing became increasingly erratic and laboured. Jack watched her slip away as her eyes became vacant. The blood slowly stopped pumping out of her chest, and her head lolled back in the snow. He sat beside her body in shock of what he had done, feeling the heat of her life sapped away by the cold. He stayed with her, rocking back and forth uneasily, unsure of what to do. The storm had disappeared as quickly as it came, and people soon began to venture out of their homes. He didn't want to see the people he had attacked; looking at their faces only made him feel more guilty as he heard people call out uncertainly for loved ones lost in the blizzard. Jack stared once more into the face of girl below him, something about her long brown hair and large brown eyes strangely familiar. Even the splash of freckles across her pale skin seemed to be egging at his memory, begging him to remember their significance. He leaned down and kissed her forehead, whispering, "I'm sorry," _

_Jack grabbed his staff and took off, flying as far from the small town of Burgess as he could. The image of the girl skewered on the icicle flashed in front of his eyes as he tried to forget the horrific event. He couldn't believe what he had done. He was a murderer. _

Jack forced his eyes open, purposely clenching his hands together as the pain from doing so jarred him out from reliving the memories that haunted him. As he looked up at the sky, he saw the golden trails of sand that brought children dreams retreating as the sun threatened to unleash it's rays across the horizon. Jack was looking at the dream sand longingly when an idea came to him. He forced himself to stand, clenching his teeth due to the hurt in his arms as he stooped to pluck his staff from off the blood stained ice. He watched the last of the sand disappear from the sky as he rolled his sleeves down and haphazardly rubbed some flakes of dried blood off his skin. With a look of grim determination he took off into the air, fleeing from the morning rays.


End file.
